


To Mend What's Broken

by flyingsolo_flyingfree



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Distinction between platonic and romantic love, Fix-It, Gen, The Final Problem
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-18
Updated: 2017-01-18
Packaged: 2018-09-18 02:07:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,484
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9360866
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flyingsolo_flyingfree/pseuds/flyingsolo_flyingfree
Summary: He's always known how she felt, of course. It was why he knew she’d answer her phone. But still, he hadn’t known, not really, not the extent of it. He hadn't fully grasped it. Hearing her cry on the phone— hearing her say it back to him, and realizing she absolutely meant it— that was what hurt.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I will be bitter about Molly Hooper until the day I die. She deserved so much better. @Moffat&Gatiss- fuck you. 
> 
> Rating is for adult language.

Being in the room with the coffin was what broke Sherlock. _Molly_ broke Sherlock, made him finally lose his composure and destroy everything around him.  

He's always known how she felt, of course. It was why he knew she’d answer her phone. He’d made a complete ass of himself at that party so many years ago, and it was one of the few times he can remember feeling remorse, feeling truly sorry for what he'd done. He treaded lightly after that, he tried to be better. Molly Hooper deserves better. But still, he hadn’t known, not really, not the extent of it. He hadn't fully grasped it. Hearing her cry on the phone— hearing her say it back to him, and realizing she absolutely meant it— that was what hurt. 

Molly was kept out of the loop about Eurus. She found out about Baker Street, but she wasn’t notified about any of what happened after. Sherlock needs to be the one talk to Molly, and he doesn’t know how. He doesn’t know what he could possibly say to her to make it okay. 

“There’s nothing you can say that will make it okay,” John tells him gently, “but you have to at least try.” 

John Watson has a penchant for being right. As useful as it is, it’s also incredibly irritating. 

 

That’s how Sherlock finds himself at Molly’s door a few days later, rapping his knuckles against the glass. It’s been a long time since Sherlock has felt this amount of sheer dread. He knows, he _knows_ that in telling the truth, he is going to hurt her. How is it that he always hurts the people who are most important to him? 

She opens the door and, evidently, was not expecting to see him. Her initial expression is one of cautious hope, but when Sherlock doesn’t move, doesn’t reach for her, doesn’t say anything, her face crumbles. Disappointment, Sherlock notes. Pain. She swallows, several times, and she looks away, behind Sherlock. For a minute, neither of them speaks. 

When she finally does, her words are clipped, her voice unsteady. “So what was the experiment, Sherlock?” 

“Molly,” he says, hushed, “we need to talk.” 

“Like hell we do,” she grits out, making no move to open the door fully and let him inside. “What was the case? What was the experiment?” she repeats, meeting his eyes again, and she’s furious, her hands trembling. 

"I have a sister," Sherlock confesses. That’s enough to catch her off guard, but Molly has known him for long enough to know that he’s telling the truth. She pushes on. 

“That’s nice, Sherlock. What does she have to do with you mocking me? With you making a damn _fool_ out of me?” She squares her shoulders, like she’s ready to fight him. “Did your sister listen in? While you made me say it, did she listen? Did John? Did you record it, project it on a big screen so that everyone in the whole world could hear how much of an idiot I am?” 

If Sherlock thought his guilt couldn’t get any worse, he was wrong. 

He takes a breath. “My sister is a psychopath. Worse, as it happens, than me,” he says, smiling a little in spite of himself, but the humor doesn’t hit where he wants it to. She stares blankly. He’s still standing outside, his hands stuffed in his coat pockets, his nose becoming colder by the minute. 

“She was the one behind Moriarty. He was her puppet. She corrupted him.” Molly’s eyes go wide. She shifts her weight from one foot to the other. She’s debating whether to let Sherlock come in, he realizes, but she’s holding back. 

Sherlock forces himself to keep talking. “She captured us, John and Mycroft and me. She put us through several ‘tests.’” 

“Like what?” she asks, and she already knows what, but he can tell she’s still concerned, she still cares, she knows that something terrible must have happened to Sherlock; in spite of her fury, he can feel empathy radiating from her slender frame, and he wishes more than anything that she were only angry. But she’s Molly, and that's not how she is.

“I watched five people die,” he says, and his stomach churns but his voice is a forced monotone. Her hands twitch, she’s about to reach for him, to hug him, but she quickly catches herself. It is enough, though, for her to open the door fully, stepping aside and indicating for Sherlock to enter. 

He steps into the living room, and she hovers near the kitchen. She glances at the kettle, still steaming from the cup of tea she just made, and he watches her war with herself about whether or not to be fully hospitable. She sighs, offers simply, “Tea?” He murmurs his _yes, please, thank you_ , and sits on the couch. 

As she grabs a mug and shuffles around the kitchen, Sherlock thinks back to a time when he thought human kindness was weakness. He would have thought someone like Molly was weak for giving second chances to the people who wounded her— to still offer tea to someone who hurt her so badly. He knows better now. He knows that people like Molly, and people like John, they’re the strong ones. 

She approaches with two mugs and he recalls that she knows how he likes his tea, that he likes it best black, and that’s something even Mary sometimes forgot. She places his tea down on the coffee table in front of him— she doesn't want to touch him— before settling on the other end of the couch, as far from him as she can. She curls up, tucks her legs against her chest, effectively closing herself off from him. He takes a sip of his tea even though it’s too hot, and it scorches his tongue.  

“What happened?” she prompts. 

Sherlock exhales. “She coerced us to do unspeakable things, because she told us there was a girl on a plane that was about to crash. We had to obey her.” 

Molly hears his word choice, and understands. “The girl on the plane...?” 

“Wasn’t real." 

“You saw people die?” 

“In some ways, I killed them.” Sherlock is aware that he sounds removed, as cold and blunt as he always is, but for once, it’s fabricated. For once, Sherlock is faking it. And Molly knows. 

“Did you actually pull the trigger on anyone, Sherlock?” She meets his eyes, challenging. “Did you put the noose around anyone’s neck?”

“I nearly did," he says, but when she says nothing and doesn't back down, he amends, "No.”

“Then you didn’t kill them.” She is firm, she won’t be argued with, and Sherlock logically knows she’s right— it’s something John has been reminding him these past few days, _we didn’t do anything wrong, we did everything we could—_  but the fact that she knows nothing about it, yet she’s still certain of his innocence, that’s the part that stings. 

Her voice is gentle. “Do you want to talk about it, Sherlock?” 

Sherlock looks down at his tea. “No, I— Thank you, Molly, but it’s...” As he looks to her, trying to decide what he wants to say, he realizes she sees it as a sort of rejection, even if his answer doesn’t surprise her. She steels herself, takes a sip of her tea. She’s waiting for Sherlock to tell her why he called her that day, why he— 

“She told me your house was rigged with explosives,” he tells her. 

She stiffens. “Was it?” 

“No. But I had no way of knowing. She had cameras on you, so she clearly had you under some form of surveillance.” 

“She had...” Molly realizes what he’s saying and clutches at her mug, turns her face away from Sherlock for a moment.  

“There was a coffin,” he says, and that, seemingly, is the phrase that breaks him open again, because suddenly there’s a lump in his throat. She looks back at him again. She can hear how close he is to falling apart.

“She told me your house would explode in three minutes unless I could get you to say—” He cuts himself off. “I was not permitted to tell you why, and I could not tell you that it was urgent.” He looks at her, nearly begging for her to understand. “I thought you were going to die, Molly. I thought I was going to have to watch you die.” 

“So that’s it, then, is it?” she says, her voice tight. “The only time you can say it is if you think I’m going to die, and even then, you can’t even mean it?” She’s stubbornly staring at a stain on the couch, trying to blink away the tears that are forming. 

Going into this conversation, John had coached him. _For once, Sherlock,_  he insisted, _you cannot plan every outcome. You cannot go through each of her reactions, calculate a response to each one. The only way you can begin to make it up to her is if you are real and honest. That involves being in the moment._ This, however, is the one thing Sherlock had prepared for. 

“Molly, look at me,” he pleads.

She does, but she hisses, “Don’t you dare.” She stands, placing her tea down on the coffee table with enough force that some of it sloshes over the edge. She paces over to the window. 

“It wasn’t a lie,” he murmurs, and she whirls around, her tears spilling over. 

“Fuck you, Sherlock,” she yells, stalking up to him. “Don’t you fucking dare. How can you, how—” 

She folds in on herself, shaking as she cries. Something occurs to her and she looks up, horrified. “So John did hear?” Sherlock freezes, and his silence is enough to confirm. “Mycroft? Your bloody psychopath sister? They all heard? And saw?” 

"I'm sorry, Molly, I'm so sorry," Sherlock croaks. She claps a hand over her mouth, muffling a sob. Sherlock stands, moves slowly towards her. She straightens up and takes a step back. He stops. 

"Please don't pity me," she says, wiping her nose on the back of her hand. "God, Sherlock, don't, please. I can't stand it, not on top of everything." 

Sherlock clenches his hands into fists, then relaxes."Molly Hooper, you are one of the strongest people I've ever known," Sherlock says, quiet but fierce. 

She's not expecting that. "What?" she stammers, her eyes filling with tears again. "Stop, Sherlock—" 

"You are one of the only people who has ever seen me at my worst and wanted me to be better." He takes a step forward. "You are one of the only reasons I have wanted to be better." 

She closes her eyes, pinches the bridge of her nose with her fingers. "Don't lie to me." She lowers her hand and glares at him. "Sherlock, do not lie to me, not again." 

"I'm not lying. Hear me," he says, stepping forward so he's standing in front of her. She doesn't move away this time. "Please hear me." 

She crosses her arms over her chest, bounces her leg and breathes, deep inhalations through her nose, out through her mouth. Sherlock knows she's trying to stop herself from crying. 

"I did not lie to you, Molly." He wants desperately for her to hear him. 

"It's not the same," she whispers. "You don't—" She bites her lip, can't say the words, "not the way I—" 

He swore he would tell her the truth. "No," he agrees, and that's it, that's the worst part, the part that burns on his tongue worse than the tea. She turns her back to him, crying again.

He takes one last step forward, touches her arm gently, so gently. Not because she needs to be coddled, but because he needs to learn to be softer, more caring. He has done enough damage.

"Molly, I did not lie to you."

He applies gentle pressure to her arm and she slowly turns to face him, wiping at her face with the heel of her palm.

"In case you haven't noticed, I'm not good with sentiment," he states.

She snorts in response. "That's an understatement." 

"Yes, it is." He clears his throat. "You need to know, though, that you matter to me. You are one of my truest friends." She drops her eyes to the floor, but he knows she's trying to absorb what he's saying as he continues. "I value you. Not because of what you do, the work you do in the lab, the way you help with cases. You are my friend. Your friendship is dear to me." 

She peers up at him. "Are you trying to compensate for three decades of having no emotions?" 

Her words are biting, but the intention isn't there, and he deflates a little, relieved in a way he can't define. 

"Maybe," he admits. He hesitates, debates whether he should follow his impulse, and eventually decides to go with it. He reaches for her shoulder once more, and he feels her tense up beneath his hand, but she relaxes again a moment later. 

"I was telling the truth on the phone. I am telling the truth now. I don't know if you can ever forgive me for what I've done, but I just—" He swallows. "I need you to know." 

They stand stock still, staring at each other. She's trying to evaluate whether he's being honest; she still doesn't fully believe him, and he understands that, he doesn't blame her. Then, suddenly, she moves forward and buries her face in his chest. 

Like expressing sentiment, Sherlock has not historically been good at physical signs of affection, either. But after he hugged John a few weeks back, stroked the back of his best friend's neck and murmured nonsense words of comfort— somehow, after that, it's gotten a bit easier. He wraps his arms around Molly and allows her to cling to him. He remembers the terror he felt when he thought he was going to watch her die, he remembers how desperate he was for her to say it, _please just say it_ ; he tightens his hold on her. He clings to her, too. 

After a long moment, she pulls back and puts distance between them. "What now?" she asks, and this is the only other thing Sherlock has the answer for. 

"Whatever you need."

She nods slowly, tucking stray strands of hair behind her ear. She doesn't speak as she walks back over to the coffee table beside the couch and retrieves her cup of tea, cradling it in her hands. She isn't shaking anymore, Sherlock notices, and he's glad. He is patient with her silence, unsure of what to do, but the ball is entirely in her court. She needs to know that. 

"You still want me?" she asks finally. Sherlock opens and closes his mouth, and she realizes her mistake, flushing deeply, but she still meets his eyes. "In your life, I mean. You said I matter to you, right?" 

He doesn't hesitate. "Yes." 

"Is that still true? Even after—?" 

"Yes." 

"I'm still angry with you, Sherlock." She's not holding anything back now, and he's glad of that, too.

"I understand." 

"I know it's a bit unfair," she says, gazing at him. "I know you were trying to save me. I know she put you up to it. But all the same," she gives a small shrug, "I'm angry with you. I'm utterly humiliated. And it hurts. Looking at you, you standing here." Her voice is small. "It hurts." 

He pauses for a moment, breathes through the guilt. "What do you need?" he repeats.

"I, um... space, for right now, I think." She seems to consider it. "Can we talk in a while? I don't know, a few weeks? A few months?" She gives him the barest hint of a smile, and he returns it without thinking. "I imagine you and John have your hands full, what with Rosie, and trying to rebuild your flat. I know I'll probably see you, if I watch Rosie. I just think I need time." 

"Yes." There's a beat of silence. As always, he needs a specific plan, so he proposes, "I will leave it to you, then, to reach out?" 

"Yeah, that sounds good," she says. 

She makes no move to hug him again, it doesn't seem like she has anything else to say, so he turns to leave. He pauses with his fingers wrapped around the doorknob.  

"For the record," he says, looking over his shoulder at her, "you have no reason to feel humiliated. None whatsoever, I promise you. I think just as highly of you as I always have." 

Then he goes. 

 

 

 

 

He doesn't hear from her again for a while. As she predicted, he sees her in passing when she stops by to watch Rosie, to give Sherlock and John a break. He sees her when she helps them during cases. She is polite and civil, but her guard is up. 

Months pass before she reaches out via text message, asking if they can meet up for tea somewhere. They choose a cafe, a date, and a time. He doesn't think he's nervous, but John says, "Sherlock, relax. This is a good thing." For all that Sherlock can make deductions about everyone around him, he tends to repress his own emotional state, which is something John has become quite attuned to. So, apparently, Sherlock is nervous. It makes sense, he supposes as he stares out the window of the taxi. There's a friendship hanging in the balance. Sherlock has had far too much experience with losing friends, and she is one of the few who matters to him. There's a lot at stake. 

She's already there when he arrives, and she stands, but doesn't hug him. It's an awkward moment, but she recovers quickly. "Go order your tea. I've already saved you a spot." 

When he returns, he sits across from her, peeling off his coat and scarf. "You look well," he observes, and it's the truth. There's more color in her cheeks than the last time he saw her; she's sleeping better. She's not seeing anyone at the moment, but she's happier, more secure in herself. 

"I feel better," she says with a shrug. 

They make small talk about work, about cases he and John have solved. They talk about Rosie, how much she's grown, how big she's gotten— how she almost sleeps through the night now, only waking up once or twice. Slowly, she relaxes, and so does he. John was right. This is a good thing.

There's a lull in their conversation, and she tugs at her earlobe. She clearly has planned some of what she's going to say, but he knows from experience that planning doesn't always make it easier. 

She meets his eyes, a bit shy, but heartfelt when she admits simply, "I've missed you these past few months." 

He's still working on expressing sentiment, but he nods, and she knows what he's telling her without words. 

"It's still hard for me, you know, some days." She stares out the window, at the people passing by the cafe. "I suspect it will be for a while. It was... God, years, Sherlock, I've known you for years now, and it was always—" She stops herself, clears her throat. 

"But," she says after a moment, "I've missed you. It's been nice, seeing you in passing." 

"For me, too," he replies, unable to look at her, but he sees her smile out of the corner of his eye. 

"I'm going to try to go back to... normal, I guess, whatever that is. I'm sorry if it isn't— totally the same as it was, if I seem warmer around John, or whatever, than I am with you, it isn't intentional, or—" 

"Molly, you don't owe me an explanation," he says, meeting her eyes once more, and she exhales. 

"Okay," she says, mostly to herself. "Are... are we okay?" she asks him softly. 

"Yes, I think we are," he says, a bit cautious, trying to gauge her response. She sits back in her seat, she's relieved, and that, in turn, is a relief to him. 

She notices something suddenly, and she looks at him curiously. "You put milk in your tea," she says, surprised. 

"Yes, well." He feels embarrassed, even though he shouldn't. It's a small detail, but it's significant, somehow. "I've been trying new things lately." 

"You have, have you?" She stares at him, really taking in the sight of him, and he wonders if this is how other people feel when he analyzes them—exposed, a bit naked. But he doesn't want to hide from her. After a minute, she nods. 

"It suits you," she says, the corner of her mouth turning up in a small smile.

And that, somehow, is what matters most. 


End file.
